LA CAADA FLINTRIDGE — Fans of the visiting Corona del Mar High School girls basketball team held signs with encouraging phrases through the first quarter.

By the time the second quarter came around, the signs were barely useful to fan themselves some air.

What seemingly looked like a competitive first-round game quickly turned into a La Caada clinic, as the Spartans ran past Corona del mar, 57-31, on Thursday night in the CIF-Southern Section Division IV-AA playoffs.

La Caada will play the Whittier Christian-El Monte winner in Saturday’s second-round game.

The Spartans (21-4) did a superb job of suffocating the Sea Kings (18-10) with a swarming defense, and it didn’t help that Corona del Mar went on a woeful 1 for 14 shooting in the second quarter either.

That’s when La Caada blew the lid open and finished the quarter on a 12-1 run.

The back door passes were there all night for the Spartans, and the Sea Kings didn’t seem to want to adjust.

Tia Chen arguably had one of her best performances for the Spartans, nearly recording a quadruple-double. She scored 14 points, had 10 steals, grabbed nine rebounds and dished eight assists.

Teammate Courtney McCutchan was not that far off from a triple-double, scoring seven points, grabbing seven rebounds and five assists.

“Tia did a great job in the first half and distributed the ball well,” La Caada coach Tamar Hill said.

There were, however, some moments when the Spartans didn’t exactly look like a top tier team.

La Caada turned the ball over three consecutive times with under five minutes left in the second quarter.

Fortunately for the Spartans, Corona del Mar did not capitalize.

“At that point it looked like neither team wanted the ball,” Hill said. “Both teams were tired and worn out but we gathered ourselves.”

So what does La Caada take from this blowout?

“We need to make sure that we’re making good decisions especially when we’re getting tired,” Hill said. “Hopefully we can get rid of the sloppiness so we’re prepared against better teams.”

It didn’t matter that his DeKalb, Ill., High School basketball team had ridden a bus two and a half hours to get to Milwaukee, then waited another hour past game time to play. Didn’t matter that the game was close, or that this was a chance to beat a big city team.

Something else was on Dave Rohlman’s mind when he asked for a volunteer to shoot two free throws awarded his team on a technical foul in the second quarter. His senior captain raised his hand, ready to go to the line as he had many times before.

Only this time it was different.

“You realize you’re going to miss them, don’t you?” Rohlman said.

Darius McNeal nodded his head. He understood what had to be done.

It was a Saturday night in February, and the Barbs were playing a non-conference game on the road against Milwaukee Madison. It was the third meeting between the two schools, who were developing a friendly rivalry that spanned two states.

The teams planned to get together after the game and share some pizzas and soda. But the game itself almost never took place.

Hours earlier, the mother of Milwaukee Madison senior captain Johntel Franklin died at a local hospital. Carlitha Franklin had been in remission after a five-year fight with cervical cancer, but she began to hemorrhage that morning while Johntel was taking his college ACT exam.

Her son and several of his teammates were at the hospital late that afternoon when the decision was made to turn off the life-support system. Carlitha Franklin was just 39.

“She was young and they were real close,” said Milwaukee coach Aaron Womack Jr., who was at the hospital. “He was very distraught and it happened so suddenly he didn’t have time to grieve.”

Womack was going to cancel the game, but Franklin told him he wanted the team to play. And play they did, even though the game started late and Milwaukee Madison dressed only eight players.

ALHAMBRA — Nobody said it was impossible, but the improbable just didn’t seem likely, especially after first-half dominance by the visiting Roosevelt High School boys basketball team.

But then came the re-emergence of Alhambra, its stingy defense in the third quarter a staple of Moors coach Joe Petralia’s philosophy that defense wins games.

A second-half adjustment is all Alhambra needed to storm back from a 14-point deficit, highlighted by Nelson Chan’s 3-pointer plus the foul with 13.3 seconds left.

Chan sank the free throw to send the game into overtime, and Aeric Allen’s layup to start the extra period gave Alhambra a lead it would never relinquish en route to a 63-58 victory Wednesday night in the first round of the CIF-Southern Section Division I-A playoffs.

Alhambra (18-9) will play the West Valley-Rancho Cucamonga winner in Friday’s second round.

Javier Lomeli drove in the lane and converted a layup to give the Mustangs (16-11) a 52-48 lead with 38.8 seconds left. Lomeli was fouled in the act of shooting and was sent to the line, giving Roosevelt a chance to extend its lead.

Lomeli missed the free throw, however, giving Alhambra possession with less than 35 seconds left.

All signs pointed to a Moors loss, especially after Allen’s 3-point attempt rimmed out, as did Jean Almieda’s putback.

Terrence Drisdom grabbed the rebound and was immediately fouled. He missed the one-and-one, and Allen’s rebound gave Alhambra possession again with 21 seconds left.

Enter Chan.

With 13.3 seconds left, Chan calmly pulled up near the top of the arc and sank a high-arching 3-pointer that sent the home crowd and coaching staff into a frenzy.
Allen, who finished with a game-high 28 points, was fouled behind the 3-point line and sealed the win for the Moors by sinking all three free throws with 1:10 left in overtime.

This game was won, however, in the third quarter.
Alhambra looked nothing in the third like it did at the start of the game. The Moors were poised and determined to drive inside, something they clearly lacked in the first half.

More importantly, Roosevelt scored as many points as it committed turnovers (six), and the Moors finished with an 11-6 run.

“We felt like we made a couple of errors that were correctable,” Petralia said.

The momentum had swung Alhambra’s way by the beginning of the fourth, and the game ended with the student section rushing the court in jubilation. The celebration later continued in the Alhambra locker room, where the team chanted Chan’s name. He finished with 13 points.

How the Mustangs’ 14-point lead at the half dissipated is something Roosevelt coach Romone Neal did not want to answer.

“Don’t remind me,” said Neal before explaining the second-half debacle. “We stopped rebounding, we stopped going to the basket and we stopped playing defense. (Alhambra) started making a little run and we couldn’t hold them down the stretch.”
The Mustangs attacked the weak side and relied on cut-back passes that resulted in easy layups in the first half.

“The kids kept their composure,” Petralia said. “They’re used to being down early, and this team doesn’t give up.”

The emotions rising higher with each connected pass and the feeling of triumph ever so close with each push up front.

Seemingly – after riding a high wave of momentum in the second half – it would be only a matter of time until the South Pasadena High School girls soccer team scored the goal that eluded them in regulation time.

But the overtime period didn’t prove to be the Tigers’ moment either as they later watched North Torrance celebrate a 4-3 win on penalty kicks after a 1-1 tie in a wild-card match of the CIF-Southern Section Division V playoffs Tuesday afternoon.

Though South Pasadena (11-9-4) gave up a goal in the 10th minute, the Tigers were a determined bunch in the latter part of the first half.

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